Wednesday, 26 February 2014

I write to express my unwavering opposition to the CITY OF MANCHESTER LIBRARY WALK FOOTPATH, MANCHESTER CITY CENTRE PUBLIC PATH STOPPING UP ORDER 2014.

Library Walk is an integral part of E.Vincent Harris's projects to enhance the civic quarter of Manchester, and his two buildings (both now listed as Grade II*) exert through their materials, forms and silhouette a strong impact on the broader cityscape. The space which joins his two powerful buildings should not, therefore, be regarded as an accidental oversight which requires remedying, but as the conscious creation of a beautiful pedestrian walk between two fine and contrasting elevations which unfold before the observer. Depending on the route taken, Library Walk acts as a dynamic frame both for St. Peter's Square, currently undergoing a major redesign, and the facade of the Friends Meeting House. This urban sequence is a unique feature of Manchester's townscape which the city can ill afford to lose.

The proposed gating of Library Walk and the insertion of a glazed link within it will clearly hinder access to this hitherto public route in the city. The unfortunate decision to create a link at ground level, in addition to the new link created between the Library and the Town Hall Extension below grade in the recent refurbishment projects, is both superfluous and detrimental to policies to enhance access to public space and the permeability of routes within the city.

During the construction process for the Library and the Town Hall extension it was necessary for Library Walk to be closed to public access. Following the successful completion of the projects it is therefore the duty of Manchester City Council to return Library Walk to full public use, and not the limited hours proposed in the Order. Failure to do so will lead to a very bad precedent being set in regard to its continuing role as a planning authority.

As an experienced academic I have had the pleasure over decades of taking hundreds of international visitors around Manchester and showing them many great buildings and, inevitably, a few horrors. Library Walk was always a highlight, and the groups confirmed that it was a uniquely delightful urban space which has few precedents. Should the Stopping Up Order be approved this innovative spatial experience will be lost to visitors and residents alike, in favour of creating yet another example of dead public space, which, when its gates are open, will inevitably be occupied by smokers banned from the neighbouring buildings. The recent installation of the misshapen roof of the link, which is visually much more dominant than was shown in the architects' drawings, demonstrates very clearly the folly of closing up this public right of way, and I hope this Order will not be approved.

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Eamonn Canniffe leads the Architecture Research Centre and the MA in Architecture + Urbanism at the Manchester School of Architecture. He was educated in Architecture at Cambridge and Harvard Universities. In 1996 he held a Rome Scholarship in the Fine Arts at the British School at Rome. Between 1986 and 1998 he taught at the University of Manchester School of Architecture, and between 1998 and 2006 at the University of Sheffield School of Architecture. He is the author of Urban Ethic: Design in the Contemporary City (Routledge 2006) (Chinese edition 城市伦理--当代城市设计 2013) and The Politics of the Piazza: the history and meaning of the Italian square (Ashgate 2008). He is co-author (with Tom Jefferies) of Manchester Architecture Guide (1999) and (with Peter Blundell Jones) of Modern Architecture through Case Studies 1945-1990 (Architectural Press 2007), (Chinese edition 现代建筑的演变 1945--1990年 2009) (Spanish edition Modelos de la Arquitectura Moderna -Volumen II 1945-1990 2013). For a number of years he has served as Architecture Series Editor for Ashgate Publishing.